DBIS News

Christmas edition

 

Dear Parents

Seasons Greetings:  Term one has raced by with our students, staff and families having been very busy throughout our seventeen school weeks.  I am sure that everyone is ready for the break to relax, recharge and simply enjoy the time of year with friends and family.  Our school continues to grow as we try to accommodate the pressures of additional families within Discovery Bay.  We have nearly 900 students and over 150 staff members.  The timetable of additional events is huge throughout the year, as you will always note on our website.

Thank you all for the contribution you make in so many ways to keep our school as special as it is in every respect.  While we are always looking to improve, it is also most important to stop and reflect from time to time upon all of the operations and interactions at and within our school.  As always it is the people who make the difference.  To this end, I want to especially thank all of our amazing staff.

It does not matter in what capacity our staff work in our school.  Everyone makes a significant contribution.  Whether it is the special engagement within the classroom between a teacher and a student, a celebration during a weekend sports game, the beautiful sounds achieved from an orchestra performance, the set up and tidy up after a Carols evening, the care taken to help parents at our school offices – or simply a most caring smile exchanged between any member of our Discovery Bay International School community – our staff members are simply fantastic!  Thank you on behalf of our school community to every one of you.

Special Seasons Greetings to everyone.  I hope you all mange to capture the essence of this festive season in the giving of goodwill and in sharing the gift of kindness.  Best wishes to you all for a safe and happy New Year.  We look forward to having all of our amazing students back for an exciting Term Two, starting on Monday 3 January 2011!

Staffing:  We bid farewell to Kate Ringrose who sadly leaves us to take up a wonderful position that will enable her to take her special gifts and talents to a wider community in Hong Kong.  We will continue our school family relationship with Kate in her new role, as she continues to assist with Green Week and a range of other environmental initiatives.  Thank you Kate for all you have given to all of our students, colleagues and families.  Julie Phelps leaves our Targeted Support teachers.  Thank you also Julie for your work with our students at our Primary School.   Julie will return to her teaching role in Australia.

We have Stephanie Ryan taking over from Kate Ringrose in Y3KR.   Stephanie has been working with the Year 3 team to ensure that we have as smooth a transition as possible both for her and our students.  Once the new term is underway Stephanie will be arranging to meet the parents of her class for parent / teacher conferences so that you can get to know her and share further information with her about your children.

I am also pleased to announce that David Sheehan will move into the vacated Targeted Support role and Ben Loran will become our DMC Coordinator for the next two terms.

 A special welcome, as always to our new staff and very best wishes to our departing staff.

Red and Green Dress Up Day: As tomorrow is the last day of term before our Christmas Break, we will be having a Christmas dress up day.  Please feel free to wear festive colours of red and green.  Ho, ho, ho!

International Food Fair:  A further thank you in following up on our biggest Food Fair yet!  It is just special for our amazing FOTS Food Fair committee to have all of the amazing support leading up to and on the day.  As noted in our special ‘thank you’ on 30 November, Natalia Veldman and the committee were so superbly organised.

It is also important to thank the many sponsors for all of your support in so many ways.  A list of our sponsors is attached to this newsletter – please scroll down the list and where at all possible – please support these organisations and businesses in return.

Wearable Art Winners:  The winners of the ‘Uniforms Of The Future’;  Verena Penders (7PA), Giada Terzi  (7PA) and Natalie Sherriff (7PA) have now completed their 1st prize visit to W.L. Gore & Associates.  This informative and quite unique learning experience involved a detailed presentation from Dr Richard Beck "AP Business Leader – Garments”.   Dr Beck outlined the design process and production of the GORE-TEX(R) products.


The students enjoyed several demonstrations of exactly how the GORE-TEX(R) material worked and why it was so special.  Their favorite part was the rain testing room where our students were able to test their supposedly ‘waterproof’ jackets compared to the GORE-TEX(R) material.  This was great fun and a superb experience.  What a first class prize following our DBIS Food Fair event.

Nursery and Reception Christmas Concerts:  Thank you to all of our wonderful Kindergarten parents for your support with our recent Reception and Nursery Christmas concerts.  These concerts certainly set up the Christmas spirit for everyone.  It was neat to see you all along at the concerts.  Thank you so much to all of our staff for your work in making each concert sparkle with the delights of our student performances.

Christmas Carols Evening: Thank you also to everyone involved with our first Christmas Carols on the pitch.  We expected 500 – we had well over 1000 people.  Our Primary and Secondary students performed wonderfully well and as always, were an absolute credit to our school.  Thank you so much to all of our staff who assisted and to our amahs who were just outstanding with the huge set up and tidy up.


Thank you to Man for your technical wizardry and thank you also to our Music Department – Ben, Tanya and Vincent.  You are all treasures to work with.

End of Term One:  A further reminder that we will close for this term on Friday 10 December.  All classes will finish at their normal times, with the exception of Starlight Nursery.  Starlight Nursery will join Sunflower for the morning on the last day and finish for the term at 12:00 pm.

Starlight Nursery Parents:  A reminder that our Starlight students are attending school tomorrow for the morning session so that they are able take part in Christmas activities with their fellow students from Nursery.  Please come to the library for registration at 8:55 am with Mrs Brink and Mrs Hendley and collect your child from here at 12:00 pm when the morning session ends.  Thank you for your cooperation to make this a fun and festive last day of term for our little ones.

Reports: All Year 1, 2 and 3 reports will be issued tomorrow.  Please remember that these reports are a set of summary statements on the application, progress and achievements of your child.  As always, please take the opportunity to speak with your child’s teacher for any further discussion concerning the ongoing learning and general development of your child.

Book Week Photo Competition:  As part of our book week celebrations which will be 17-21 January we will be having a photo competition …’Extreme Reading!’  During the holidays you may find the perfect photo opportunity. We hope our students will have lots of fun reading in unusual, funny or extreme places, and take a photo to prove it! The possibilities are endless…maybe reading on a mountain top, in a cave with a torch, in a cable car, in the snow, on the MTR or next to the Big Buddha! We will display all the ‘extreme reading’ photos in the library with prizes for the winners.  Have fun! - Kate Basford

Hockey Tournament:  We arrived at Happy Valley right on the whistle of our first match after a rather long detour!  This did not stop our squad of nine winning their first match.  We beat Hong Kong Football club B 2-0.    Unfortunately we lost our next two matches against HKFC A and GIS A 2-1 and 2-0 respectively.  We went on to play Shaheen B in the play offs and won 1-0.  It was a match full of beautiful teamwork and a fantastic finish from Joseph Brown.  We came out fifth out of eight – a job well done by everybody!

Our Under 12 team made a positive start to the season at the Valley Round Robin Tournament on Saturday 27th November at Happy Valley by drawing two games, being narrowly beaten in two games and unfortunately beaten for a medal place on penalty strokes.  The team captain was Teagan Pye was player of the match.   Our team voted Jamie Kennedy player of the tournament for his fine performance in goal.  Thank you to our coaches and to our parents for your support - Kate Young Coach.

Year Six Netball: Last Saturday we had twenty Year 6 girls participate in their first ESF Invitational netball tournament.  All the girls played their hearts out and improved hugely as the morning progressed.  The A team showed great team work and support for each other which resulted in them coming second in their pool.  They progressed through to the quarter finals.  DBIS B team lost their first match to the eventual winners but it didn't deter them from constantly making improvements to their game, passing and moving with greater confidence.  Overall it was a fine performance by all the girls.

This week our Year 6 students played four matches this week against Discovery College,  two girls teams and two mixed teams.  We won three and drew one match 0 - 0.  All the students played particularly well and the girls clearly used what they learnt from the matches on Saturday.  All good preparation for the two matches the first week back after Christmas.  Thank you to our coaches – Ms Walden, Ms Basford and Ms Chambers for your help and support at both tournaments.

Fees, Levy and Other Related Payments:  Please be reminded that it is our school policy not to allow outstanding fees to be carried forward into the following term.  Kindly send in any outstanding payments to our school office on or before 4 January 2010. 

Sports and Athletics Days:  Our PE department have recently coordinated two very successful sports days.  Our first off site Secondary Athletics day was held last week in the Tsing Yi Sports Stadium.  It was superb day, our students participated in a broad range of events and recorded some excellent times and distances.  Our Year 1 and 2 Sports day was held this morning, providing our students with a fun filled and challenging end of term event.  It was great to see so many parents along to enjoy both events.


Secondary School Building: The ground breaking Bia Seng’ ceremony was held this morning on our Secondary School building site.  Whilst work has been underway for a few weeks now, this was the contractors opportunity to officially recognise the beginning of the building project with their staff.

Term Dates 2011 – 2012 School Year:  The following dates are presented for our 2011 / 2012 School Year.  Please note the slightly later start to the start of the new school year.  Two of the breaks require further confirmation as noted.

Term 1

Monday 22 August 2011                 Start of the new school year.

Monday 17 October to Friday 21 October 2011 Mid Term break (to be confirmed).

Friday 16 December 2011                 End of Term 1.

 

Term 2

Monday 9 January 2012                Start of term 2.

Monday 23 January to Friday 27 January 2012        Chinese New Year (yet to be gazetted).

Friday 30 March 2012                        End of Term 2.

 

Term 3

Monday 16 April 2012                Start of term 3.

Friday 29 June 2012                        End of the school year.

Thursday 23 August 2012                Start of the new school year for 2012 / 2013

 

Upcoming Events in January 2011

Monday 3 January

• Start of Term 2

Monday 10 January

• Year 1 parent conferences

Tuesday 11 January

• Year 1 Circus afternoon

• Year 1 parent conferences

Wednesday 12 January

• Year 1 parent conferences

Thursday 13 January

• Year 1 parent conferences

Friday 14 January

• Year 1 parent conferences

Monday 17 January

• Book Week begins

 

Kind regards

Grant Ramsay

Principal

 

Community Notices

Disclaimer - The following notices are presented as a community service.  While the content is proofed and generally summarised, it is important to state that the information contained in these Community Notices in no way reflects Discovery Bay International School policy or practices.

dBayRadio - Christmas Greetings:  If you have a special Christmas message that you would like to broadcast on dBayRadio, make an mp3 recording (eg record it on your iPhone) and send it by email to  dBayRadio News – if you have any announcements of events that you would like dBayRadio to broadcast, please email the details to

Carols & Nativity in the Plaza, Sunday 12 December 5:30pm:  The story of Christmas comes to life! Lots of well love carols to sing accompanied by a traditional brass band! An ecumenical event by the combined churches of Discovery Bay


Christingle & Nativity, Discovery Bay Church (Anglican), SKH Wei Lun Primary School Hall, Friday 24 December 6pm:  The nativity story in which every child can play a part. Beautiful Christingle oranges given to each child. Come and catch the spirit of Christmas!


Midnight Mass, Christmas Eve, Discovery Bay Church (Anglican), Friday 24 December 11:30pm: 
Celebrate this most holy night with carols and worship to usher in Christmas. A bilingual service in conjunction with Church of the Incarnation (Anglican - Cantonese).


Christmas Family Eucharist with carols, Discovery Bay Church (Anglican), SKH Wei Lun Primary School Hall, Saturday 25 December 10am:  All are welcome to join in the lovely traditions of the blessing of the crib and lighting the candles on the Advent Wreath.

Antenatal courses coming to Discovery Bay!:  Expectant parents no longer need to trek into Central to attend an antenatal course – A Mother’s Touch will be holding antenatal courses every month in Discovery Bay.  Alternating between evenings and weekends to suit your schedule, classes will cover how to prepare for labour and birth, the transition to parenthood, and provide information about breastfeeding and basic baby care.

The first course will run on Saturday 22nd & Sunday 23rd January from 9am-1pm, with further courses running on Wednesday evenings from 16th February - 9th March, and on Saturday 12th & Sunday 13th March.  For more information please visit http://www.amotherstouch.com.hk, or call Liz on 9769 2701.  

 

DAVINCINO Painting Classes:  If your kids are feeling artistically inspired, sign them up for the new lessons starting January 14 at DAVINCINO Painting Classes for Kids and Teens. Pls. visit our website: http://www.davincino.com or contact us for more details.  Davincino  Irene- 97724035  Grace- 62736764